Two Posts In One Week

This one is just a short note about something I was excited to learn, that a book review I wrote will be appearing in The Iowa Review's online series.  I am excited because it's a great journal and because, at the risk of sounding mercenary, as I'm not exactly flush with cash, the compensation they offer is welcome.  But I'll be even more honest and admit it's really more the idea of being compensated for a piece of literary writing than the check itself.  It just doesn't happen too often these days, and I can completely understand why.  We can't afford to pay at Melusine.  No independently funded small journals or presses can.  There was a time, oh so long ago, when all creative writers were paid for their words, and those times have been fading faster and faster.  I'm not really here to lament that fact.  As long as there are day jobs or university positions and writers' retreats/workshops/conferences or coffee shops, writers who want to write and need to write will find a way to write and earn a living as well — as long as there are people who read, even if those people are solely other writers.  But the people who read do have to continue to exist, in order for the writers to continue writing.  Long may they.  We, that is.

Another Month, Another Random Update...

So now it's October.  (I always feel proud when I manage at least one blog post a month.)  In lit news, I got word yesterday that one of my poems, published in an online issue earlier this year, will be featured in The Medulla Review's second print anthology -- good times! 

Before long, I'll need to start work on Melusine's first print edition -- kind of a daunting task, I must admit, since I haven't dealt with the offline printing process since my college's lit magazine, and that was not self-funded.  But it will be kind of exciting.  I'm looking forward to starting the selections at the beginning of the year -- the fun part.  The new online issue is slated for late November, which has been the pattern for the past few years.

In more monumental lit news, I was happy to hear that Tomas Transtromer got the Nobel.  Yes, he happens to be Swedish, but he's a hugely influential poet, not just in Sweden or in Europe but the world over, and has been for some time.  And the man is 80.  Now is the time.  He fully deserved it, and I think it was a good choice.

Book Review in Lines+Stars

Now that it's September, and feeling like September, with the remnants of a hurricane cooling us with a week's worth of rain, a little news:  my review of Holly Karapetkova's debut collection, Words We Might One Day Say, appears in the new issue of the D.C.-based journal Lines+Stars.  Read it if you get a chance.  I seriously enjoyed and recommend the book in question.  The rest of the issue is worth checking out, too, with the theme of "Distractions & Amusements."  Now that it's September, of course, I'm wishing I had taken more vacations this summer.  But even though we mostly "staycated" this year, we did manage to get in some distraction and amusement.  Now it's back to business.  Mostly.

July

Well, it's been a little while again, despite the resolution to post here more frequently.  (Maybe I should just stop making resolutions -- err, I mean post more often ;)

But I've been keeping busy with a bunch of stuff, some of it writing-related.  I'm finishing up the final revision draft of my chapbook and hope to send it out at the end of the week.

And then I'll probably take a hiatus from poetry for at least a few weeks, maybe a month, so I don't get that awful feeling of, oh, if only this new one could have gone in there; it's oh-so-much better than the others -- a feeling that often turns out not to be true, fortunately.  No poem seems quite as perfect as it did the first moment after it was written.  A workshop instructor once gave the wise advice that there should be a cooling-off period, at least a counting-to-10 period before sending a composition that still has that "new poem smell" off to a journal (imagery mine).  Its imperfections will become apparent enough within 24 hours.

And I answered some editorial questions on behalf of Melusine for the "Six Questions For" blog, if you want to check it out here.

Well, until next month, I guess... enjoy the rest of your summer.  It is too dang hot lately, but then winter is too dang cold.  That's the way here in the Mid-Atlantic, anyway.  At least there is September coming, and eventually another May...

New Melusine

I have once again been burning the midnight oil working on a new issue of Melusine.  (It's still Friday somewhere—specifically west of Vegas.)  Melusine 3.1, the Spring/Summer 2011 issue is up for your reading pleasure, if you're interested.  I think it turned out pretty well.

In other writing news?  Hmm.  I'm writing, indeed.  Been sending stuff out here and there, including some fiction.  Starting to polish the final draft of the chapbook manuscript, which is exciting.  Despite the heat here in D.C., I love summer, but there's at least one reason I'm looking forward to Fall this year...

In the "Nice Problems to Have" Category...

... I had to decline an acceptance for publication of a much earlier version of the chapbook manuscript that will be published by Dancing Girl Press this fall.  As an editor myself, I feel sort of shabby about having to withdraw a manuscript after it was accepted, but I honestly believed that a year was the cutoff time to expect an answer one way or the other, since the maximum advertised wait time had been six months, and it's been over a year and a half.

I also feel shabby for complaining about wait periods, but it can be hard to wait sometimes, especially when it comes to "firsts."  It was the same way while I was waiting for those first few journal publications, and this will be my first print chapbook.  But sometimes with my own journal, I end up making people wait longer than the advertised time, and I feel shabby about that, too.  It happens, and there are generally reasons -- the chief one being time and the lack thereof.  The press in question is one I admire, and I know they are swamped with manuscripts.

But all's well, and I'm proud to be appearing with Dancing Girl Press, which to be honest was my first choice of publisher for this chap, although the version that DGP accepted wasn't the first one I submitted to them, and I have to be honest again and say that I'm really glad that's the case, because the revised lineup I have right now is the first one I feel really 100 percent confident about sending into the world.  I tried to convince myself I felt that way about the previous versions, but it was more like 99 percent and falling with every re-reading.

That doesn't mean I think this iteration is perfect, or that any poem I'll ever write will be perfect, whatever that means, much less a book of 'em, but I feel good about it, and not afraid to see it in print.  Let's be frank one more time:  the thought of seeing one's work in book form for the first time is exciting, but that's a different matter than feeling OK about the work itself.  I feel OK about this work.  (And I'm fighting off with a stick the temptation to add a disclaimer, like "for the moment," durnit.)

March Mirth

Yesterday my copy of the new Tiger's Eye arrived containing my poems "Sunday Blue" and "Mountain Bird."  Beautiful issue with some really nice stuff, from what I've read so far.  Looking forward to reading more tonight.

In other news, so glad it's March.  I just realized that March is possibly my favorite month.  It's not that I enjoy the weather and landscape of this end of the month -- the snow's usually gone and not much is left but the accumulated dreary -- but I do like the sweet anticipation of April.

By the time April actually hits, the daffodils in front of our house have shot up, the cherry blossoms are out in full force downtown and so Spring in D.C. has essentially hit its peak, always leaving me feeling that I've missed something.

On this side of the month, it's all about the waiting.  All the good parts of the year, while not here quite yet, are swiftly on their way, and that always gets me to feeling giddy, yet still somewhat serene, because we're not there yet.  There's still time to be reflective.  Maybe this time of year has even prompted a few (mostly harmless) bouts of hypomania some years, but I'm no psychologist, so we'll just call them "happy spells."  And wish a happy March to you.

Update:  Less than an hour after posting this, I learned that the new issue of The Medulla Review had launched, featuring three poems of mine.  Read the whole awesome issue here, or my poems here.  March is coming in mirthfully indeed.